I would like to continue the story from the book 'If I Stay' by Gale Forman. In the book, Mia, a quiet introverted person falls for adam, a punk rock artist. As their relationship grew, Mia was involved in a car crash that killed her entire family. Throughout the story Mia is stuck 'inbetween' life and death and is faced with the choice to either stay with Adam or leave with the rest of her family. In the book she decides to stay but I want to create an experimental video with the idea that she decided to let go and leave. I will make this experimental by portraying the cloudy chaos that is going on in her head at the time. I want this idea to stay somewhat abstract in the fact that the ideas/feelings will stay the same but it will not be portrayed in such a traditional way. I plan on twisting the concept of the story by portraying the idea of 'what if she doesn't stay', 'then what?'. I have always loved this book and this was the first story that came to my mind when we were presented with this project. I plan on starting the story out with her stuck in the 'inbetween' where she is struck with panic and chaos and then finally she decides to make her final decision to leave the world. I will be inspired by the original story from all of it's beauty and how delicate and perfect the author describes the characters. The climax of the story will be when her eyes pop wide open and all sound cuts out where she finally makes her decision. After that, she will awake in 'heaven' and things will appear to be very peaceful but she will slowly start going insane which is where the story will cut out. The main point of the story is not have a happy ending, in the book she decides to stay and it was a great decision but in my film she is going to make her final decision to leave and when she has finally left this world, she wants nothing more than to take it back.

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This photo helped inspire my idea because it really this phase in life that I want to try to portray in my video. Also, the mood that this photograph evokes is how I want the beginning portion of my video to be.

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This is my favorite quote from the novel and it was one of the big things that really inspired me. This quote really gave me my idea because I want to portray what the second option to the biggest choice of her life could be.

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I want to work in a lot of close up shots like this one into my video. I think that sometimes stills are more powerful when inserted into a film. Also, I want to try to play with putting parts in black and white to evoke the right mood.